Monday is usually my day off from running. However, I had another plan today. My daughter lost a hat at the Agriculture Museum Friday. Since I work close to the museum I decided to run over there if it had found.

I called the museum when I got to work and sure enough someone had found it and it was waiting at the admissions counter. I don’t normally need an excuse to run since I usually take Mondays off but this provided me with justification to go for one.

Good thing because it was a perfect day to get out of the office for a run…

Once I got going I felt good so I decided to push the pace a bit a give myself and unplanned tempo run. In the end I picked up the hat and ended up with a 7.8 km tempo run. Not a bad way to spend my lunch hour.

Since I started my training cycle for the Ottawa Marathon Tuesdays have been pencilled as my day for fitting in an 8 km run with accelerations. However, this run is proving to be the most difficult run to fit in as per my schedule. It is a bizarre trend that has developed in my weekly training.

For a variety of reasons, week after week I just cannot seem to fit in this run. What keeps happening is that I end up with an extra day of rest after my scheduled day of rest on Mondays.I’ve had the best of intentions to fit in this run but whether it is because I was busy at work or busy at home after work I am finding myself having to postpone this run.

It is not such a big deal since I have been able to delay the run to later in the week it is funny how this trend has developed. In order to make up for the missed Tuesday run I have either been running twice one day per week or I have been running on Fridays when I also do not have a scheduled run.

In the end maybe it is not such a bad thing that I keep taking Tuesday off from running. Since I am doing my strength exercises on Mondays, the day after my long run, Tuesday is giving my an actual day of rest. Tonight when it became apparent I would not fit the run in I got out my foam roller and also did some yoga stretches. I figure that for this reason the trend cannot be that bad if it keeps up.

Do you find yourself developing trends like this in your training schedule?

Today I decided to take a much needed rest from running. A combination of heavy mileage last, a 32 km (20 mile) run yesterday and not enough sleep over the weekend made it an easy decision.

Although I had a bit of a streak going, my last rest day was just over a week ago, taking a day of rest today was the right call to make. Resting today will turn out to be more beneficial than whatever mileage I would have managed to complete today.

I am currently at the point where I am completing my heaviest mileage before the Ottawa Marathon. Last week I completed 100 km and my plan for this week is the same. Therefore, tonight’s rest will be beneficial in helping me hit that goal.

I think had I decided to run tonight whatever mileage I completed would have been worth the risk of getting injured or sick. Tomorrow I will get back on track toward my goal for the week.

When you reach a point where you are physically and mentally exhausted do you find it easy take a rest day or do you try to push through?

Given that Canada Day fell on a Friday this year today is the start of a long weekend here. I’ve been off to a pretty quiet start so far.

I was tired because I was up pretty early and my legs felt like they could use a rest so I did not force myself to go for a run this morning. The fact that I am running the kilt race in Perth tomorrow also has me feeling like a day of rest is a good idea today.

Skipping a run today will still leave me with about 50 km for the week which is around what i have been averaging since the Ottawa Marathon. That will start to pick up again in a few weeks as I begin my 16 week training program for the Philadelphia Marathon.

Later today I’ll probably end up spending some time in my in-laws pool so I guess that sort of counts as cross training. Other than that it will be a pretty low-key day.

As already mentioned, I am doing the 8 km kilt race tomorrow, not sure that I’ll be breaking any records in that one given the heat and the fact that I will be wearing a kilt, and Sunday I will head out early to get in a long run before it gets too hot.

What are your running plans for this holiday weekend, for those of you in Canada and the United States?

As I mentioned yesterday today was scheduled to be a rest day for me in terms of running. While I did not go for a run today but it certainly was a busy day.

Since today was a statutory holiday here, my wife and I planned to do some work in the backyard to get the garden ready for planting our vegetables. If you want to read more about the project you can check out her blog here.

For me the project mainly involved hauling 24 x 24 patio stones, at 77 ibs each, from the driveway to the backyard and lining them up in the frame to build the raised bed. I lost count but I think my father in law and I handled about 44 patio stones today!

Here is a picture of the finished project, minus dirt which will arrive tomorrow…

I am not sure how today will impact my planned schedule of runs this week but so far I am feeling good. No aches or sore muscles so far. Even if that changes by tomorrow morning I figure I can drop tomorrow’s run if necessary for an extra day of rest without much of an impact on my remaining training schedule before next Sunday’s Ottawa Marathon.

On the schedule for tomorrow is an easy 8 km run which I am hoping to be able to get in before I head to work.

Today I had planned to do an easy 8 km run. However, after a great weekend in terms of weather we had rain on and off all day today. I did not end up going for my run since it was raining hard when I left work.

I may end up doing the 8 km run on Thursday when I had originally planned to take a rest day. However, since I only had an 8 km run planned for today it will be easy to get in the mileage over the course of the week.

Considering the fact that I am planning 10 Yasso 800’s Thursday I would still like to use Thursday as a day of rest. If that is the case I will probably end up spreading the 8 km over the rest of my runs this week. For example, tomorrow it would be easy to turn my scheduled easy 10 km run into an easy 12 km run.

With 90 + km logged last week and a similar pace this week I am reaching the peak point of my training for the Ottawa Marathon.

My legs are starting to feel it too. I cut my speed work short last night because my legs felt tired although that probably had more to the fact that I ended up playing indoor soccer at work on Tuesday which probably was not the best way to spend what was supposed to be a rest day following my long run Monday.

The good news is that after a shorter than expected run yesterday and some use of the foam roller my legs felt better tonight when I headed out for my 12 km easy run. I ended up finishing the run in 1:01 tonight.

As I have already mentioned a couple of times, I did not get into the New York Marathon via the lottery yesterday. As a result, I am considering other options for another fall marathon. Right now I am leaning towards the Philadelphia Marathon in November. From the feedback have received so far it certainly sounds like a fun event. Have you run the Philadelphia Marathon before? If so I’d be interested in any feedback you can provide.

I am also still open to other options that are not too far from home. Let me know if there are other fall (October or November) races you would recommend.

After a rest day yesterday I had an easy run on the schedule for tonight. I am not sure what it is but I find it generally takes me me a few minutes to get into a run following a day off. Either I start too quickly or I start too slowly.

Take tonight’s run. I was planning an easy run of about 10 km. I felt like I started off too quickly, although I find that is especially easy to do when the sun is shining and there isn’t a cloud in the sky as was the case tonight. It took me the first 1.5-2 km to really feel comfortable running steadily at my intended easy pace.

In the end I managed to slow things down and finished with 9km in 45 minutes or 5:00/km which is about where I want be for my slow runs.

How do you find your first runs after a rest day? Do you have difficulty getting back into your rhythm?

Next up for me tomorrow is my first set of hill repeats. and a total distance of 14 km. I have been trying to run a hillier course at least once a week since I started my training for the Ottawa Marathon but this will be my first set of hill repeats – this is where you find a decent sized hill and run up it at or near race pace then jog back down the hill before starting your next repeat. I will be doing 7 repeats tomorrow.